Higher pay, job creation top government priorities

Malacañang yesterday reassured Filipinos that addressing economic issues such as higher pay, inflation and job creation are the top priorities of the Duterte administration.

Presidential spokesperson Ernesto Abella issued the statement yesterday after a recent Pulse Asia Survey showed that the most urgent national concerns of Filipinos include increasing salaries of workers, controlling inflation, and generating jobs.

In the survey conducted March 15-20 among 1,200 respondents, higher salary for workers remained the most urgent national concern of 43 percent of respondents while controlling inflation or price increases was at 41 percent and creating more jobs at 39 percent.

These concerns are among the priorities of the government as highlighted in the 10-point socioeconomic agenda of the President, embodied in the Philippine Development Plan 2017-2022, to equalize opportunities for human development,” Abella said.

“The President is particularly concerned for the poor, excluded and underserved,” he added.

The Palace spokesman said the government is increasing spending on infrastructure and social welfare protection, improving ease of doing business and creating more jobs to sustain the economic growth of the country.

“The survey coincides with PRRD’s priorities of serving the nation’s interests which have been long neglected,” he said.

The Palace also boasted about the recent economic developments in the Philippines, while President Rodrigo Duterte is in his weeklong state visits to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Qatar.

“While President Rodrigo Duterte is off to the Middle East to try to strengthen bilateral ties and attract more investments and trade, the domestic economy is definitely on an upswing,” Abella said in a statement to Palace reporters.

He credited Duterte’s economic managers for the bullish Philippine economy. Abella added that such performance also showed that investors have a positive outlook on the country’s economy.

“What all this highlights is that the Duterte administration’s economic team are on the right track in economic construction and that investors remain optimistic on the growth trajectory of the Philippine economy based on our sound economic fundamentals,” he said.

“The peso has strengthened back to the P49 level against the dollar. This is the peso’s single biggest gain since March 2016 and erased all losses so far this year.” “The Philippine Stock Exchange Index is up 0.45 percent to 7,617.91, its highest level in six months,” Abella said.

The Palace official also noted that credit rating agency Fitch Ratings affirmed the Philippines’ investment grade rating with a positive outlook and boasted about the net inflow of foreign direct investments.